Chapter 19
GIANNA
I remember very little of the rest of yesterday. But I remember the kiss that brought me back to life. It was like Matteo had reached his hand down into the darkness I was sinking into and pulled me back out into the sunshine. Back into life.
They took me to the hospital and it was dark outside by the time we got home. I slept and dreamt of the near drowning. But it wasn’t a nightmare… because of that kiss. I relived everything in the dream and it was better than in real life.
I want to see him again. I want to thank him. And I want him to kiss me again.
But he hasn’t been in to work yet.
“How can you be so calm and smiling?” Chiara asks, looking at me with eyes open wide in shock. “You almost died.”
I’ve just been sitting on the sofa, sipping chamomile tea which my mom keeps bringing me and remembering that kiss. It was just like the sparkling sunlight outside. Only better. Because I felt it too. I wasn’t just looking at it.
“Maybe it’s exactly because of that,” I say. “I almost died and now I love being alive so much more than before.”
That’s not the whole truth. The kiss is the whole truth. But I haven’t told them about how Matteo makes me feel yet. Every time I try, I just can’t find the words. There’s so little to tell and yet so much.
“I understand completely,” Lidia says. “It’s just like in this book I’m reading… “
Chiara sighs loudly and rolls her eyes. “Real life is completely different than a book.”
But I tell Lidia I want to hear all about it and she tells me the entire summary of the book. It’s a sad one, about two very ill people falling in love. She hopes they’ll both live. I doubt it.
“How can you stand sad books like that?” Chiara asks once Lidia is done talking. “Isn’t romance supposed to be fun?”
“What’s better than two people who have nothing to live for finding love?” Lidia asks. “I can’t think of a thing.”
“Oh, I can think of plenty,” Chiara says. “For example, two people who can enjoy that love finding love. Or…”
I stop listening, leave them to their bickering and return to the kiss.
That’s what we are, Matteo and I. Two people who have nothing good to live for.
He has his dark past that he left behind when he came here, and I have a dark future of being stuck in my high tower alone for the rest of my life.
But he’s come to rescue me. And together we’ll rescue each other. Just like in one of Lidia’s books.
And this kind of thinking is exactly the reason why I can’t tell my sisters about him. Chiara will mock me like she mocks Lidia, while Lidia would likely understand, but only as far as words go. Neither of them knows what love feels like. I don’t know either. Or didn’t. Until now. I think.
So I’d like to sit with it alone for a little longer. Keep it a secret. Hope it grows and blossoms.
As has been happening all morning, I get the urge to check if he’s arrived, is out there in the hall guarding my door.
I’ve given in to the urge to check each and every time I’ve felt it.
And been disappointed each and every time.
But this time it’s different. I can literally feel him out there.
The world is warmer like a ball of light, the sun itself has found its way into the cold, marble hallways of this building.
So I don’t think, I just go check. There’s no room to think in my mind anyway, because the urge to go to him is all there is.
Chiara calls after me as I get off the sofa and go to the foyer, but I ignore her. And I don’t even check through the peephole, I just step out into the hall. And come face to face with Matteo. The sun’s heat has nothing on the radiance he gives off. Absolutely nothing.
“Good morning,” I stammer, surprised my voice hasn’t been burned away by his heat.
“‘Morning,” he replies gruffly, his eyes, his whole face obscured by that dark shadow that’s all his own. How can such sun shine from a man so lost in shadows?
“I just wanted to thank you properly for saving me yesterday,” I say, my voice shaky, but at least it’s audible.
“That’s the second time I saved you, Goldie,” he says. “You’re running up quite a tab.”
He’s standing so close to me that my back is practically pressed against the door and his imposing, sun and shadow presence seems to be sucking up all the air in the empty hallway.
“I’d like to make it up to you,” my voice says on its own, with no input from my brain. But it is exactly what I want so it’s OK.
He somehow expands even closer without actually moving.
“Do you now?” His voice is at once menacing and the most inviting thing I’ve ever heard.
“Yes,” I whisper, my voice sultry because my throat is suddenly very dry.
His eyes light up for the first time since we started this conversation. It’s like when the sun breaks through thick, black cloud cover. Brilliant and dazzling, eternally beautiful and meant just for me.
“I’m sure we can find a way,” he says, menace and invitation once again playing tug of war in his voice.
“When?” I breathe.
He laughs, a sound that’s neither pleasant nor scary, but both those things combined.
“Soon.”
The smile that erupts on my face happens without my conscious control. “I hope so.”
“Just don’t tell anyone.”
I shake my head. “I won’t.”
I whisper it to show just how committed I am that this stays a secret between us. Whatever this is. A promise? A lie? The only thing I wanted to hear? It’s that third one, definitely.
A door opens somewhere down the hall, and he steps back from me, his face impassive, his eyes looking right through me. Footsteps are coming in our direction and I go back into the apartment before whoever it is reaches the bend in the hallway and sees us here together.
A secret it is. The most cherished secret I’ve ever kept. And I don’t even know what it is. I just hope it involves him kissing me again. For real this time.
He must have felt the blinding light of that kiss of life he gave me. He probably wants more too. And that’s what we just agreed on. To give each other more of that. Because it’s necessary and the only right thing to do.
Even though everyone else would say it’s wrong.